Armenia’s capital turned pink due to ancient volcanoes: Do you know how?
What all do you know about Armenia? Just like Turkey, it is a gateway between Asia and Europe, although it is primarily an Asian nation. What else? Yes, it was a former Soviet Republic, and is mostly surrounded by the Caucasian Mountain range. Not only that, it is known for its pagan Greco Roman Temple of Garni, the Christian Etchmiadzin Cathedral (oldest cathedral in the world) and the Buddhist Khor Virap Monastery. Apart from these, Armenia is also well-reckoned for its beautiful landscapes, oldest cities, delicious cuisines and as the first country to adopt Christianity officially. But today, we are going to talk to you about a lesser-known aspect of this Asian nation. Just like in India we have Jaipur as our pink city, Armenia too has its own pink city. It is none other than its capital Yerevan. However, unlike Jaipur, Yerevan is kind of naturally pink. Here’s how that happened.
How did Yerevan turn pink?
In the Turkish-Armenian border stands Mount Ararat that overlooks the Armenian capital city Yerevan, shrouded in pink. In fact, this particular city that is full of Soviet architecture, wide streets and spacious city squares derived its nickname Pink City for its very view – as all of them are built out of pink stones to match the surrounding landscape. In fact, during sunrise and sunset, the pink is at its best, while it keeps changing throughout the day depending on the sunshine.
Okay, but where do the pink stones come from? Experts suggest that Armenia sits on a hot volcanic belt and more than 3000 years ago an ancient (now extinct) volcano called Azhdahak erupted, leaving behind a kind of rock made of compacted volcanic ash. Called pink tuff, this pinkish lava rock (shades ranging from bright to light pastels to orange) turned the entire city of Yerevan pink and had even destroyed it back then. So, even if the parts that were not pink prior to this volcanic eruption turned pink. Now, when the then Armenians tried to rebuild the city, they could find nothing else but these pink rocks to do so.
An American volcanologist named Jack Lockwood who was studying Yerevan in the late 1990s had said that the unique pink colour was a result of both the speed of the lava flow and high rate of oxidation. He also explained how this pink rock is nothing but oxidised form of ignimbrite (originally greyish), which is welded tuff often found in the upper vents of volcanoes and release only when the eruption is massive and the flow is thick and dense. Over time, when the rock fragments deposited on flat terrain away from its volcanic source, it ended up oxidising and thus underwent a change in colour.
What’s interesting here is that, as Lockwood rightly pointed out, this pink tuff isn’t strong enough to support infrastructure. Can you guess what this means? Yes, deep within, the city of Yerevan is made up of hard crystalline volcanic rock called basalt, while the pink rocks were only provided as top coating, not only because of their colour but also fine texture.
One of the oldest inhabited cities
History suggests that Yerevan was founded as early as 782 BC by Urartian King Argishti I along the Hrazdan River, thus making it one of the oldest inhabited cities in the world. Originally, the founder named it Erebuni, but back then the area was too mountainous for any human settlements. But soon, around 4th century BC, humans slowly tried to explore the region and form civilisations. In fact, experts believe it was because of too much human activity that the volcano got triggered. Later, the city got its actual name from its King Yervand IV.
What’s interesting is that, Yerevan only became Armenia’s capital in 1918, during the World War I. In fact, it was the nation’s 14th capital. In November 1920, Soviet Russia invaded Armenia and made Yerevan the capital of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic alongside being one of the 15 member states of the Soviet Russia. Until then, Yerevan was a small town, but it was quickly transformed by the Soviets into a metropolis comprising of a million people. Not only that, Russian-born Armenian architect named Alexander Tamanian was commissioned to re-structure the city and give it today’s circular layout. As a result, he was forced to destroy many ancient buildings and replace them with contemporary style Soviet buildings. But one thing he did for sure. Maintain its Pink City status, thus using the same locally found pink stones. This gave the city its uniform and symmetric pink look. Fortunately, in 1991, Soviet Russia was dismantled and Yerevan became the permanent and independent capital of the Republic of Armenia.
Architectures around the city
The majority of Yerevan is pink in colour. Some of the notable structures around include Republic Square, Northern Avenue, Etchmiadzin Cathedral, History Museum of Armenia, National Gallery of Armenia, Saint Gregory the Illuminator Cathedral and Republic Plaza.